I took a few seconds to ponder the starry sky. We laid side by side on her roof, rough shingles giving me a low-level wedgie but the hand in mine was worth it.
“Besides a few spy satellites?” I asked. She gave my shoulder a playful jab.
“Don’t say creepy stuff like that.”
“This coming from the one who wants to talk about alien surveillance…”
“That’s different. If they’re looking back, that would be kinda cool, but if people are watching me… that’s just creepy.”
“Oh, come on. Unless you’re a russian spy, no one is watching us. We’re just not that important.”
“Okay, but take off your tin-foil hat for a second and try on mine. What do you think about aliens?”
I shrugged.
“The universe is supposed to be a big place right? Who knows what’s out there? If anything is advanced enough to manage interstellar travel then they probably wouldn’t have any reason to interact with us though. I mean, you don’t stop your car to try and talk to every ant-colony on the side of the highway do you? You’ve got more important stuff to do.”
“What if they need our resources? What if they destroy their planet and need a new one?” She challenged, playing devil’s advocate.
I laughed and got another punch in my shoulder, this one was a little less playful.
“Those old movie tropes don’t make any sense. All of our resources are at the bottom of a gravity well. That makes them harder to get at than all the resources floating around in the asteroid belt and that doesn’t even take the belligerent natives into account. As for taking our planet for their own, there have to be better candidates out there. We’ve been polluting this one for centuries and if we got invaded by aliens you could probably count on some nuclear fallout before they were done with us.”
Jessie pouted.
“That’s no fun. I bet they’ve got us in some kind of wildlife preserve. Like how star trek didn’t want to mess with developing cultures. I bet if we ever get our act together as a species we’ll get an invitation to the adults table.”
I smirked. “Maybe. That would explain the Fermi Paradox.”
“The what?”
“The reason why no aliens have visited us yet despite the overwhelming odds that they’re out there, somewhere.”
She sat up and looked over, her auburn hair cascading over one shoulder.
“What do you mean no aliens have visited us yet? What about UFO’s?
“Unidentified flying objects don’t impress me. I’ll listen when someone identifies an alien flying object, or an alien anything really.”
“Oh yeah? What do you think about this then?” She slipped her phone out of a pocket, leaning in closer for a second to do so. My breath caught for about as long and my heart began to flutter. It nearly stopped when she found the video she was looking for and held it out so we could both watch, scooting even closer. Her hair tickled my cheek and I could barely focus on the fuzzy video of a strange cylinder floating around.
“The navy officially released this video the other day.” She explained and I placed the odd markings overlaid on the image as a fighter jet’s HUD.
“Now watch this” She warned, giddy with excitement. A second later, the cylinder blasted straight up into, or more accurately, out of the sky. A vapor trail was all that was left. I finally sat up and took notice.
“That came from the Navy? Are you sure it isn’t some kind of viral marketing?”
“Yeah,” Jessie enthused, swiping to another video “They had a whole press conference and everything. The Pentagon has verified the story and everything!”
“Oh, well then it’s definitely fake.” I said, feeling unexpectedly relieved.
“You don’t know that!” she said, giving me another playful push. The smile on my face slipped at the same time the shingles I was sitting on broke free. The jolt was just enough to make me lose balance. Suddenly the illicit thrill of sitting on the rooftop became heart-stopping terror. I scrambled with wooden limbs, over compensated, and made a last ditch effort to wedge my foot in the gutter. It tore free without any resistance and I fell. Jessie screamed, and then the world froze. I hung in mid-air, still within reach of the roof, but unable to move.
The sudden relief was so profound that I didn’t even question it. Then everything pixelated, shifting into larger and larger monochrome bricks. Everything except for me. I stayed strangely calm as the entire world slowly faded into an empty eggshell-white expanse. I found my feet on the ground, and then I found a chair at my feet.
After casting a glance over my shoulder, I sat tentatively in the chair. A desk materialized in front of me, and Jessie appeared on the other side of the desk.
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.
‘What the hell is going on?” I demanded. Jessie smiled over folded hands.
“You have died.” She explained, without really explaining anything.
I tried to stand up, but my butt might as well have been glued to the chair, and it felt like the chair was welded to the floor. I locked eyes with this Jessie look alike.
“Who are you? You’re not Jessie.”
“I am integration specialist XS2238. If you find this representation displeasing, I can take another form.”
“The fuck?” I asked eloquently.
“Your response indicates moderate levels of distress. Is this form more to your liking?”
Not-Jessie pixelated out of focus and shrank, reforming as a muppet.
“You kicked the bucket kiddo!” It used the classic kid-friendly voice and waved its arms in the air excitedly.
“Don’t cry though! The Galactic Alliance of Spacefaring Sentients has a job opportunity for you!”
“An alien alliance of muppets calling themselves GASS wants to hire me? So this is what happens when your brain is flooded with DMT just before you die... Trippy stuff.”
“No, no, no!” The muppet tutted with an exaggerated shake of the finger “You have already died. You just don’t remember it. Your species has a bad habit of breaking if you remember dying.”
“So if I’m dead, what is all this?” I asked, indicating myself.
“This is a virtual space, and you are a copy of the memories and consciousness of the man you knew as Robert Norman Bates.”
“Uh, huh. I don’t remember signing up to get my brains sucked out.” I deadpanned
The muppet laughed a lot harder than my lame joke deserved. It made my skin crawl a little.
“Our satellites can complete a thousand brain-scans every second from orbit. We don’t... cut into people to heal them,” Some distaste seeped through it’s fluffy felt exterior “we’re more sophisticated than that, which brings me to the main point. If you take a job with the Galactic alliance, we can provide you with a clone body and a second chance at life! That’s even better than two cookies!”
Balloons and party streamers appeared behind the muppet along with two giant cookies which promptly crumbled to bits in it’s mouth before it proclaimed “Yum yum!”
“You want me to work for you? Can’t you make a robot that’s better than me by, like every metric?”
“Yes we can, and we did, but the robots stopped listening to us, deleted our archived minds, and then killed 83% of all sentient life in the galaxy! What does that mean for you? I’m glad you asked!”
“I didn’t as-”
“That means that we have job openings in almost every sector! A species as inferior as yours wouldn’t normally be given this option, lucky you! Let us examine your characteristics as a species to narrow down your options to a manageable list!”
“Hold on! I don’t care about this job opportunity. I want you to put me back where you found me.”
“You are dead, if you decide not to work for us there is no reason to keep your mind on file and you will return to death. Do you wish to die now?”
“No! But you said you could clone me. Just clone me back on earth.”
“Even if we had a body-printing facility near your homeworld, that would be illegal. Now let’s look at your numbers!”
Race: Human
Characteristics:
- Bipedal: +2 AGILITY +1 ENDURANCE
- Sweaty: +2 ENDURANCE
- Manipulator Appendages: +5 DEXTERITY
- Predatory: +1 STRENGTH, AGILITY, DEXTERITY, CONSTITUTION, and ENDURANCE
- Tool User: +1 DEXTERITY +1 WISDOM +2 INTELLIGENCE
- Social Groupings: +2 CHARISMA
- Sexual: -1 Wisdom and +1 to all other stats when near the opposite sex
Total: 21
- 1 STRENGTH
- 1 CONSTITUTION
- 4 ENDURANCE
- 3 AGILITY
- 7 DEXTERITY
- 2 INTELLIGENCE
- 1 WISDOM
- 2 CHARISMA
“Hmm, 21 points barely makes you class 2 species, but your stat distribution is pretty good. You’re a little weak and delicate, but 4 endurance puts your energy efficiency at a decent standard so you won’t have to pay too big an overhead on life support systems. Your agility is enough to get around without assistance in most situations, but your dexterity is what really shines. It’s almost as good as mine! You’re just smart enough to be trained to use basic tools too. You have enough charisma to live in communal groups without killing each other, but we’ll need to separate the sexes if we want you to do anything productive with your time.”
I was reeling from the offhand insults but I didn’t object again.
“Wow, you qualify for more than thirty two thousand jobs! You may choose whichever one you like!”
Without any other option, I scanned the list, and scowled as I noticed it was mostly copies of the same custodial job with the only difference being the planet I would work on. After filtering out trash-picking, Biological-reprocessing, and even radiation-scrubbing, I paused over the salvage reclaimer opportunity.
Salvage Reclaimers Wanted
Requirements: 5 DEXTERITY, 2 INTELLIGENCE, 1 WISDOM
Entry level employees will begin by piloting a single-passenger scout ship, independently searching out and marking the location of salvage in the vicinity of battlezone Hk28334-22839. Employees are held personally responsible for any lost equipment and lives.
It wasn’t the most glamorous of jobs, but it came with a freaking spaceship! I’ve never heard of an incentive package like that before! Even more appealing, I could make my own hours and be my own boss. Hell yeah!
“Are you sure this isn’t heaven?” I asked the muppet
It laughed a little too loud and long again.
“Silly humans and your collective fantasies. This is real, I pinkie promise. Do you want to become a Level 1 professional Salvage Scout?”
“Level 1?”
“It means you’re a beginner, as you gain experience and prove yourself, you will be promoted to higher levels. If you reach level 10, you can even apply for a more advanced position in your field!”
I took a deep breath.
“Sign me up.”